To think we have lost sight of what teh correct weight for a child is

[sassysally]

All these parents have gone, outraged to the mostly national press because they don't think their child has an ounce of fat on them, and the newspapers have published them,but to me are all clearly too heavy

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How chubby are the little blighters all going to get when free school dinners for all starts?

While stuck in the interminable queue at the Natural History Museum last week I was struck by how chubby many of the children were (and indeed many of the adults). My eldest is 10 and has a similar build to mine as a child. I was tall but not considered particularly slim, whereas I have trouble buying skirts and trousers for DD as most of them are far too big on the waist.

I think you may have a distorted opinion on normal sleeve length.

I think the girl in the first picture looks overweight. I think the difficulty is that there is a point where once crossed it is very difficult for a child to lose weight without a big change in diet/exercise. A couple of years ago DS and one of his friends were at that point. I remember looking at DS and thinking if he put on any more weight he would look overweight. MIL/FIL would say, "oh, he's active, it's just muscle", but IMO at that age, "stocky" is not muscle - he's only now at nearly 12 and hitting puberty, developing real muscle. We made lots of changes and now he's thin and fit. His friend went the other way and is now very overweight.

There's quite a few children at DD's school who used to look stocky and are now overweight. A lot of children will hit growth spurts but an awful lot seem to hit growth spurts but continue to put on weight in proportion.

Provided children are active and eat a reasonably well balanced diet, there is no need for constant weighing, measuring, charts and comparisons.

Therein lies the problem; some children (far too many IMO) don't eat a reasonably well balanced diet and don't do enough exercise. Too many families make even short trips in the car, the children don't go out to play preferring to sit and play computer games instead and too many families eat junk food in front of the tv.
Years ago sweets, crisps and unhealthy foods were a rare treat but exercise was a daily normal event, nowadays the opposite is true and we have lots of overweight unhealthy children as a result.
Even when charts and measuring is used though some parents still refuse to believe that their children are overweight.

As a professional communicator, it fascinates me how resistant so many people are to the tsunami of messages that get about the dangers of obesity. This isn't just messages passing people by, although that will be a factor to an extent, it is active refutation and disbelief about what we are being told.

I don't have the answer, but clearly the comms aren't working.

It may have something to do with the obsession people have with wanting babies to be big. "They need meat on them" and "ooh I love them like that" with health visitors seeming unhappy unless a child is climbing up the centime charts. These babies are soon little kids, let them be what they're supposed to be. Eat healthy proper food and run around. Bmi is bad though as people's bodies are different and you CAN get heavy fit people and slim unhealthy ones. It's a shame the school nurses don't have time to properly analyse each child's diet, body, exercise and lifestyle so just send out these bog standard letters.

That's a good point layl

You could tell a HV your house is burning down around them and they'd still not look up from the weight chart such as the obsession is.

There's no acceptance for happy healthy babies who are developing just done. It's all about that line.

One minute your being told to out cream in the mash potato the next your child is too heavy.

Just fine

It's been interesting to see a couple of different kids over this Easter hol. My 3 eat a pretty bad diet (crisps, choc, fried stuff), but are as skinny as anything. They just don't seem to put weight on - I never have to worry about too many puddings unless it is for their teeth. They are very, very active though.

My dniece (4) is naturally quite 'heavy' even though she eats very well and in fact eats less in terms of portion size than my kids. My dsis was like this until she was about 8 or 9, I think, then totally slimmed out and is now slimmer than me. Dsis fully expects her to come out as overweight in her check, but there's not much else she can do about it other than prepare to feel humiliated, but she knows she is doing her best and is already (imo) a bit too 'on top' of what her dd eats.

Then there was a little French girl who came to stay who eats INCREDIBLY healthily. In fact, I have never see such a healthy diet (mostly fruit and huge amounts of veg, no bread, very few sweet things, no dairy etc.). She's very high energy too. Anyway, she is the same age as my kids, but considerably bigger and could look like some kids in these pics. It's very hard to judge imo and I think genes has a whole lot to do with it.

I think my babies looked fat, but the fattest (DC3) has the odd crease and no rolls, and is on the same line for length and weight (95th IIRC). Other people coo and fuss and show me pictures of babies with great rolls of fat that make me but which they think looks normal.

Until relatively recently, children rarely sat down unless they were eating. That's what it's been like for mine for most of these holidays - scampering into the garden at 9am and having to be dragged in for a bath at 7pm. They have been bottomless pits but since it's been mostly real food (as opposed to crisps and sweets) they've been burning it straight off.

YY, my the HV's were always worried about my children's weights as babies (dropping centiles from birth). Now they are very happy with them, even though ds1 has some eating issues and can get TOO thin at times. It seems like they are never concerned about that.

DD2 was measured at school last year and I don't really understand it to be honest.

She is, and pretty much always has been, on the 25th percentile for both height and weight. When I got the letter with her BMI it was also on the 25th percentile?

DD1 is overweight. Not hugely, she was measured last year also and her BMI was 92 and overweight starts at 91 if I remember correctly. I can see she is bigger than she should be, though she started her periods less 6 months later which could have had an effect, but everyone tells me she is fine!

I think the way to create a fat adult is to start telling them they are fat when they are a child (however subtly/ unintentionally). Of course junk food and sweets all the time as "normal" is another way to create a fat adult - but tell an active child wating heathy food to appetite they can't have xyz, have to have a suddenly smaller portion and "be careful" and you negin to chip (no pun intended) away at their self image and create a self fulfilling prophesy. Equally praise a child for a naturally slim build and you set a powder keg of potential eating disorders ready to explode should they happen to put on a few pounds during puberty... The puritan tutting and no
nonesense calling out the "fat" can do as much
damage long term as "head in the sand" where diet
is basically sound and the child is as active and physically fit as the naturally thin one.

AIBU to think anyone who encourages/takes part in judging the children of strangers of a public internet forum needs to take a long hard look at themselves?

They went to the papers!!!

They want the attention

And we aren't judging.

It's true, there are many threads about this, parents do. Have a blind spot with regards to their child.

Like it or not we are responsible for what they eat and how much and we do need to be aware of how different out ideas can be.

Granted they are daft but still judging children based on their weight/appearance

Besides the parents went to the press, not the poor bloody kids involved.

Isn't the thread judging the weight-blind parents, not the children? Surely nobody believes a 5yo or 3yo has any control over his/her size?

I do think we have lost sight of how children are supposed to look. It scares me how many "chunky" children I see at my dc's swimming lessons. I do think the children in the pictures look overweight. These parents can kid themselves all they like but it you are fat at 5 you are more than likely going to be fat at 10 and so forth. Apparently this is down to the fact that your eating habits have been set by then.

My dc were all really fat babies. I weighed and measured them today (needed to I order to order bikes). My ds is 8, he is a slow grower, is small for his age and has always been slim. His bmi came out on the 85th centile. He is however pure muscle. He doesn't even look chunky, you can see every muscle on his body including a full six pack. He does 4 hours of gymnastics a week, 2 hrs of rugby and swimming. He is always on the go. It does show that sometimes the centiles are not a true reflection.

My ds2 is the one I worry most about. He is 3 and on the 65th centile but he is a very fussy eater. I also feel I have little control over his diet. Yes I ensure we eat healthily at home but just last week they did two lots of baking at preschool and an Easter egg hunt, then at our toddler group there was a party with unhealthy food followed by another egg hunt. He went to a birthday party yesterday and came home with a party bag full of cake and crap. Tomorrow the gp's are doing an egg hunt. There is a constant bombardment of rubbish food and thee is only so much I can say no to or hide without making it into an issue.

My DD got

One of these telling her she was borderline overweight.

She was a huge baby 8' 9oz but not long so very chunky.

But I still don't think she's overweight.

She is stronger than other girls her age. I see them at soft plays and the skinny ones can't pull themselves up or have the stamina to keep going for 2 hours.

I wouldn't want her to change her size.

Well their children aren't reading this. They can however see their faces on the news papers.

No ones judged the kids at all. I think op has proven her point pretty well. That we have stopped seeing a problem with our children and that is having a knock on affect. I agree that most people are doing their best and yes there are many variations that mean that this one size fits all approach isn't the best way, however, the health of out children is important and I don't think it hurts to make parents aware of this. And I'm amongst those that have likes and thought, I don't overly see a problem. So it's certainly the for me that maybe my idea of healthy isn't exactly spot on either. I'm
Grateful for the reminder of that.

Have looked

Gosh.... I hate this.
DS8, wears age 9/10/11 clothes.
He's 1.4m tall.
Weighs very slightly over 5 stone.
He is top percentiles of height/weight charts.
He has a squidgy bum! You can see all his ribs and collar bones.
He's bigger boned than most of his friends (as me and DH were also).
We are not fat! If I get too thin, I have this massive rib cage sticking out, with a weird going in stomach, and look very odd indeed.
Not all children are stick thin. We are all different.
Fat is not good - but everyone is a different shape.
(Though I would LOVE to have been one of those stick thin children...).